


HAIL, HAIL, FOR THE KING IS HERE

by ivorygates



Series: To Let His Kingdom Rise [3]
Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, Dark, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-19
Updated: 2012-12-19
Packaged: 2017-11-21 12:34:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/597825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivorygates/pseuds/ivorygates
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A sequel to "To Let His Kingdom Rise", which is itself a sequel to "Close To Bone".</p><p>  <em>It's almost a year since Minnesota.  They're got a suite at the Four Seasons; it's the West Wing Presidential Suite, the best in the hotel.  The six of them are heading out for London tonight; a midnight flight; and they won't be checking out of the hotel when they leave, but it doesn't matter, because the card they checked in on doesn't exactly belong to any of them.  </em></p><p>  <em>Two weeks ago JD said they were done -- they'd finally rooted out the last of the Consortium -- and now it was time to vanish once and for all.  London's the first step on that road.  Daniel doesn't know where the end is.  JD loves them all, but he's cautious.  Caution keeps you alive.  </em></p>
            </blockquote>





	HAIL, HAIL, FOR THE KING IS HERE

"I got a letter from Jack today," Daniel says, sitting down again after topping up Mitchell's glass.

It's almost a year since Minnesota. They're got a suite at the Four Seasons; it's the West Wing Presidential Suite, the best in the hotel. "Just up the street from the big guy, and hey, you want to stop in for old time's sake?" JD asked when they made the reservation. His comment reminds Daniel that General Hammond is Vice President now; he wonders how much of a difference that makes. The six of them are heading out for London tonight; a midnight flight; and they won't be checking out of the hotel when they leave, but it doesn't matter, because the card they checked in on doesn't exactly belong to any of them. No worry about running up a bill.

Daniel's always loved London. He was looking forward to going. Two weeks ago JD said they were done -- they'd finally rooted out the last of the Consortium -- and now it was time to vanish once and for all. London's the first step on that road. Daniel doesn't know where the end is. JD loves them all, but he's cautious. Caution keeps you alive. They're safe enough in Washington (if they don't stay too long.) Who'd look for them here?

"Ah...?" Mitchell says awkwardly.

"Oh don't be _silly,_ darling," Vala says reproachfully. She glances sideways toward JD, who's lounging with easy grace at the end of the suite's second couch. "General O'Neill's dead. I mean, isn't he?"

"Yes," Daniel says quietly, and the note in his voice makes JD glance toward him curiously. He raises his eyebrows, and Daniel smiles at him. 

"You going to keep us in suspense, there, Dannyboy? Or is it a case of the postal service being really slow?" JD asks lazily.

"Yeah," Daniel answers, sipping his Scotch. It's part of their victory celebration; $400 a bottle; Daniel picked it up while he was out. They're all drinking tonight, even Teal'c, who had to be coaxed into it, but Daniel told him it was a ritual observance, one drink, and he never had to do it again. "No," he continues. "Jack always kept a bunch of emergency mail-drops all over the place. I thought I'd just check the one here."

"Was there actually something in it?" Sam asks, surprised. She sips her Scotch and frowns at the taste. Scotch isn't her drink any more than it's Mitchell's (vodka for Sam, or sometimes tequila, and for Mitchell it's always bourbon), but Daniel poured them all good stiff ones when they gathered for the celebration and to receive JD's briefing, since of course they'll all be traveling separately, for security purposes. The suite comes with Baccarat accessories; it's seventy-five hundred dollars a night, and if Vala hasn't exactly learned the value of money, she's learned its buying power. It's Vala's opinion that at that price, the cups should _at least_ be silver. Vala likes Scotch -- but then, Scotch has always been JD's drink, and Vala likes to do the things JD does. Daniel, well, Daniel's developed a taste for it over the last two and a half years.

"A package," Daniel says. He sips again. A dead man's legacy -- a few files and a microcorder with some short snips of audio -- he'd nearly destroyed it all without looking at it, but a scholar's curiosity had won out. Who could Jack have left this for except for him? He and Sam were the only ones who knew Jack's system of drops, and Daniel doesn't think Sam knew the one in DC. It was the last one Jack set up; he'd told Daniel about it when Daniel came to DC for that budget hearing, back when he and Vala were still shackled together. 

He'd taken it off to a nice quiet spot and gone through it (made sure, first, it wasn't simply a bomb; he wouldn't have put that past Jack, not really.) The audio files would have been hard to follow except for his years of practice. There were a few photos. A very long letter, rambling by virtue of having been added to at odd times over almost seven years. It amounted to a diary. A confessional.

"You said it was a letter," JD says, contradicting Daniel fondly. He grins. "The Old Man leave us a going-away present?"

"Of sorts. You never told me he tried to kill you," Daniel answers. There's something in his tone that makes Mitchell shift and frown just a little, like he's having trouble following the conversation. The other three haven't caught it yet, and JD's still more curious than worried; he knows Daniel will never betray him. 

"He tried to kill all of us," JD says.

"No," Daniel says. "Before. When he thought you were still in high school in Colorado Springs. It was lucky you'd already left, wasn't it? I guess that wasn't really the reason you kept moving, but it was a nice dividend, wasn't it?"

"Hey," JD says, still trying to spin this into a joke (but Daniel, sitting beside him on the tasteful blue couch, can see his eyes, and they're cold, so cold), "you know the Old Man was playing all of you -- us. Daniel, anything he left at one of his drops, he knew you were going to find."

Daniel shakes his head. "No. Hoping, maybe." He glances across to the other couch, where Sam and Mitchell are sitting together at one end with Vala on the floor between them, while Teal'c regards them paternally from the overstuffed chair pulled up to the end. The six of them are gathered around the coffee table, with its Scotch bottle and silver tray, like children huddled around a campfire against the dark. It's dusk outside, but Daniel can't see it; JD has drawn the curtains, just as he always does, and the lamps of the suite throw back a cool sheen from the cream-and-gold walls, as if this is a very upscale _ha'tak_. "I'm sorry, Sam, Vala, Cameron, Teal'c. We're all in this too deep," Daniel says.

"Too deep for what, Daniel?" Sam asks. She frowns, puzzled at what he's saying (implying), tosses back the last of her Scotch (to get it over with quickly, Daniel knows) shuddering a little at the taste, and sets her empty glass back on the tray beside the bottle.

"To get out. To deserve to get out, really. I should start from the beginning." He'd like to get to his feet and pace -- he's always preferred to be on his feet when he lectures -- but he doesn't think it would be a good idea right now.

"Yeah," Mitchell says. "With a wind-up like that, I guess you should, Jackson." He, too, finishes his drink, sets his glass on the tray, and drapes an arm around Sam.

"Ah ... before school's in session, Professor, where's the letter?" JD asks lightly. He reaches down to the table to pick up the bottle and pour himself another drink, then leans back against the pillows at the end of the couch again. 

"Gone," Daniel says. "I destroyed everything. I remember what it said, though."

"You always did have a good memory," JD says approvingly. "Go ahead, then. Tell us what the Old Man's trying to pull on us from beyond the grave." He raises his glass. "Here's to the great Jack O'Neill. Nice guys finish last."

"He wasn't a nice guy," Daniel says. "You were right about that, though not for the reasons you let us see. Most of what was there was, oh, I guess you'd call it case notes. Dating back years. Things he never wanted me to see, because he never wanted me to know the things he did, or the things he thought about doing. You ever heard of something called 'Code Xerox', JD?"

JD purses his lips for a moment, then nods. "Sure. That was the Old Man's code name for me. For all of us, I guess."

"No," Daniel answers, pausing to sip his drink. "Just for you. Like I say, it started when he went to your foster family's house the day after he'd dropped you off at the high school. He went in the middle of the night intending to kill you. Nobody'd really ask too many questions if you were found dead in your bed of a heart attack. Nobody was really sure how the Asgard cloning process worked. But you were already gone."

"Daniel!" Sam says. It's an automatic protest, even after what they all know about Jack. Daniel shrugs. Teal'c is watching him intently, unspeaking, and Daniel suspects that Teal'c may already have guessed how this story comes out. Teal'c holds his glass between his hands. He hasn't drunk much of it yet.

"He said all this himself, Sam," Daniel says, and his lips stretch in a brief half-smile of apology. "The letter was typed, but he initialed every paragraph and signed every page. I'd recognize Jack's handwriting anywhere. For the next year and a half after JD vanished Jack spent every free minute he had trying to track him down so he could put a bullet through his head. He hired professionals to find him -- you. Just to let him know where you were so he could come and finish the job." He's talking to JD now, not Sam, and JD doesn't look really surprised at anything Daniel's saying. "One of the reasons -- the main reason -- he took the job in Washington was to be able to hunt you down more effectively. It was all there: names and dates and payoffs to mercenaries who -- somehow -- never came back."

JD laughs. "I spent a hell of a lot of time looking over my shoulder. I always thought it was the Consortium. A private grudge-match all this time?"

Daniel shakes his head, but he isn't disagreeing. "You could say so." He sighs and leans back against the couch cushions; sips again. "The early part of the diary is pretty sketchy. Once we all disappeared and started running dark, there's a lot more detail. All your contacts with him -- he managed to tape parts of a couple of your calls. That card you sent him -- oh, JD, how could you do something that stupid?"

"Hey," JD says, sounding a little irritated. "The whole point is to get the enemy off-balance and make him make big mistakes. You know that, Daniel."

"Yeah," Daniel says. He's tired, but he can rest soon. "But it was a Christmas card. I didn't go up to Silver Creek until the following November. The previous December, we were all still pretty sure that Jack was on our side. You remember? An innocent dupe?"

"He wasn't," JD points out. "You're the ones who said that. Not me. I would have been happy to leave him in peace."

"Sorry," Daniel says, disagreeing. "That's the one thing neither one of you was willing to do for the other. He tried to hunt you down and kill you. You..." Daniel hesitates for a long time "...you invented a fantasy about a mythical Conspiracy so we'd join you. And so one of us would kill him."

"Jackson, are you crazy?" Mitchell protests. "We saw the evidence, man! You couldn't fake something like that!" He's indignant and uneasy, and there's an underlying irritation coming from watching Daniel sit there and calmly accuse JD of what he's accusing him of.

"Jack's the one who told me that any evidence could be faked," Daniel answers simply. "He was right. It doesn't matter now. By the time I killed him, we were all guilty of murder a thousand times over."

"Oh, what are a few murders between friends?" Vala says defiantly. "Besides, your General Landry was going to sell both of us to the Ori, Daniel darling. I'd call that proof of _something._ "

"So would I," Daniel answers, "if we'd ever gotten a confession. Jack was pretty sure Landry was involved in _something_ \-- that's why Landry acted so guilty when we kidnapped him -- but Jack thought Landry was involved with the Trust and Ba'al. Ba'al was too smart to ever want to cut a deal with the Ori, and he'd never have handed over valuable hostages. Speaking of which, JD, now that we've wrapped up the Consortium, when are we going after the Ori?"

JD takes a mouthful of Scotch. "I think I'll leave answering that for after you wrap this up, Daniel. Because it sounds as if you're making a lot of accusations for which any proof has _conveniently_ vanished, and I'd like to know why."

"No," Daniel says quietly. "Not accusations. I'm as much to blame as anyone. Neither of you could have acted any differently. Jack ... was a thug and an idiot, expecting you to walk away from your -- _his_ \-- life and pretend to be a fifteen-year-old boy. _He_ wouldn't have. And you were him."

"Not any more," JD says, and now that Daniel looks for it, expects to see it, he can see the white-hot thread of anger and resentment there beneath the surface of JD's easy charm. "Not for a long time."

"No," Daniel agrees. "And he left, and you came back, and I -- and _we_ \-- all got something we'd been missing for a long time. Did you know that when Mitchell first joined the team -- well, when he pretty much _was_ the team -- he used to make jokes about being an adrenaline junkie? Only they weren't really jokes."

"Hey," Mitchell says softly, sounding hurt.

"I'm sorry if I ever looked down on you for that, Cam," Daniel says, turning his head to look at Mitchell. "I had no right to think I was any better than you were. I was as much of an adrenaline junkie as you were, and when JD showed up, I was in _desperate_ need of a fix. JD offered me everything I'd ever wanted -- everything I'd been missing -- on a silver platter. I jumped at it. Jack thought JD's plan, the whole faked conspiracy -- and it _was_ faked, I promise you -- was arranged purely as revenge. Maybe it _was_ just about revenge at first. I don't think it was later."

Sam makes a faint choking noise; horror, disbelief. She reaches a hand down to Vala, and Vala reaches up and clutches at it. Mitchell tightens his arm around Sam's shoulders.

JD applauds slowly. "Nice. Very nice. Hey, for an encore, maybe we can play charades. So the Old Man gives you a nice big bag of fake evidence telling you that I made up the whole Consortium and led all of you on a four continent killing spree just to amuse myself. And you're sitting here and telling me you believed it? I saved your life, Daniel. I saved all of you. I never made any of you do a damned thing you didn't want to. You always had proof."

"Imagine my surprise," Daniel answers dryly. "But Jack's evidence was compelling." He looks at his friends. "I'm sorry," he says again.

They're starting to understand what everything he's telling them means. Vala just looks tired. Sam looks stunned and horrified -- groggy, too, but her drink is hitting her hard. Mitchell looks grim -- still not wanting to believe any of this, but knowing there's _something_ terribly wrong if Daniel is saying these things.

"So O'Neill's convinced you that _I'm_ the bad guy after all," JD says, and his mouth twists in an ugly smile. "And you're going to do what -- exactly -- with this sudden change of heart? Try to take me out?" 

Daniel smiles wistfully and drains his glass. "It's the only thing to do at this point, don't you think? How can I let you live? I thought I'd try poison." 

"Sure," JD says. He looks at the others. "I guess we're going to be going on to London without Jackson, guys." He looks back at Daniel. "Remind me not to eat or drink anything you haven't tasted first. I'll have to tie you up, but I'm sure the maids will let you go after we're gone. Then you can confess to your heart's content. Enjoy prison -- if you get there alive."

"I won't," Daniel says. (He knows, too, from the file Jack left him, that this is merely a show for the others, to try to bring them back into the fold: JD would never leave him alive behind them. Jack wouldn't have either, if this had been Jack. But Daniel's killed Jack.) "And you don't have to worry, JD. I won't leave you."

"You've got that a little backward, don't you?" JD says harshly. He reaches for the bottle again, but this time he misses. He looks at his hand as if it's betrayed him, and sits back slowly. His glass falls from his fingers and rolls across the floor. The carpet is thick; it makes no sound.

"No," Daniel says sadly. "I'm sorry," he says to them all, for the third time. "Do you think I'd tell you I was going to poison you beforehand? You're the one who taught me how to take the seal off a liquor bottle and put it back undetectably. And I'm the one who opened the Scotch, remember?"

JD stares at him narrowly, unwilling to decide whether this -- all of it, any of it -- is some long elaborate unfunny joke of his lover's. But Sam is slumped on Mitchell's chest now, half-asleep, and Mitchell's face is sick and stricken. It's enough of an answer, even beyond what Daniel knows his own body is telling him. "You should be feeling a little cold by now," Daniel says. "I am." 

_"Jackson,"_ Mitchell croaks. He's staring at Daniel, and the expression on his face is that of a man who actually can't make up his mind whether or not he wants to be dying of poison right now.

"I know it would have been kinder not to tell any of you," Daniel says. "I thought about it, believe me. Just poison the lot of us and leave our bodies to be found. But after what we've done, I'm not sure we deserve that much kindness. It won't be long. And it won't hurt."

"What is... what...?" Vala asks. Her voice is a little slurred.

"It's that _Goa'uld_ poison we used in Russia a few months ago," Daniel says. He has to speak carefully to keep the slurring out of his own voice, but he doesn't want it to show. "It even works on Jaffa. I'm sorry, Teal'c. That's why..."

"I understand, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c says, inclining his head slowly. He looks down at the nearly-untouched drink in his hands and drinks it down swiftly, then gets to his feet, moving with ponderous grace, and moves to the coffee table. He picks up the bottle, uncorks it, and drinks deeply. "May you make the journey to Kheb safely, my friend."

"And you," Daniel answers, though he hopes never to see Kheb again -- or any afterlife.

Vala is holding out her hand for the bottle; Teal'c carries it back to her. She puts it to her lips and upends it defiantly; Daniel sees her throat work as she drinks. "Goodbye, darling," she says, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand and then dabbing delicately beneath her eyes (wanting to spare her makeup, even now), "I'd have done the same thing, you know." With Teal'c's help, she climbs up onto the chair and settles herself in his lap.

Sam and Mitchell are in each other's arms now. Daniel can't tell if they're still breathing; Sam's face is pressed against Mitchell's chest and Mitchell's face is buried in her hair. As Daniel watches, Mitchell's hand drops limply away from her back.

"You stupid fuck," JD says. "We could have had it all." He shakes his head hard, trying to keep his eyes open.

"I didn't want it all," Daniel says, moving over on the couch until he's next to JD (hard to move; he almost left it too late.) He pulls JD against him clumsily. JD's skin is cold, now, and JD was always so warm. "All I ever wanted was you."

"I ... what?" JD says. He's a little dazed; the effect of the poison counterfeits drunkenness.

"You," Daniel says. "I wanted you. I loved you. I love you. I still love you, god help me. That's why I couldn't let them take any of us."

"Me ... not ... him?" JD says slowly, as if he's trying to work out the answer to a riddle he's spent his life trying to solve.

"You," Daniel says, feeling his eyes burn with tears. "Always you."

He moves closer. JD's lips are cold when Daniel kisses him, and JD's only semi-conscious now. Daniel feels himself graying out -- like going to sleep, only he's died enough times to know the difference -- but he wants JD to take the feel of this kiss with him. He wants it for himself. Because it _is_ JD, the dark twisted mirror of Jack, that Daniel loves with his whole heart -- even now, even knowing what JD has done and what JD has led them all to do -- and if there is anything left of light in Daniel's darkness, it is only that he can't live with that knowledge. 

It's dark now, though the lights in the room are still burning, and he can't feel anything. He and JD are going down into the dark together. Daniel has loved Jack for so long that he can't remember when it began, but it was JD that he'd given himself to completely, body and mind and soul, and Daniel thinks, perhaps, that it's because he's dark somewhere inside too. He's not sure which of them he loves most, but dark calls to darkness, and JD never deserved to be alone.

It is Shifu's face that follows Daniel down into the dark.

#

**Author's Note:**

> Once upon a time Synecdochic wrote "Close To Bone" and I wrote "To Let His Kingdom Rise" and after that, the whole world wrote fixits, and alternates, and revisions to make the original story come out, um.... less darkity-dark with extra darksauce? Something like that.
> 
> But I like dark. So I continued my story...


End file.
